New techniques in Synthetic Biology enable the design and construction of novel artificial biological pathways, organisms or devices, or the redesign of existing natural biological systems.
We can engineer a bacteria to sense specific chemicals in its environment.
In fact, we can give the bacteria the ability to detect specific contaminants and to generate an output signal.
To achieve this, a plasmid containing genetic information is inserted into the bacteria.
In presence of a specific contaminant, the bacteria produces bioluminescent proteins, making it glow.
In the abscence of the contaminant the bacteria stops producing luminiscent proteins. Now we have a full biosensor.
Then, we can integrate the biosensor with a mechatronic system.
FishBot 0.1 is our first prototype of robotic fish designed and engineered using biomimetics, softrobotics and synthetic biology techniques. It incorporates a soft materials mechanism called “BWDM” (Biomimetic Wire-Drive Mechanism).